1/2     If you're planning to swim in really cold water, what type of grease
        is appropriate to smear on your body?  I read somewhere that swimmers
        do this, but I need to know what kind of grease is used.
        \_ I bet pretty much anything goopy enough to stick.  Why don't
           you go smear yourself in crisco and give this a shot?
        \_ See, they have these things called wetsuits now. Drysuits too.
        \_ Bear fat. It's traditional.
            \_ Are you being serious?  In context, it's...rather hard to tell.
        \_ If you are going out into the Bay or the Pacific around the Bay I
           would recommend smearing fish and seal guts and blood all over
           your body, maybe mix in some vaseline.

1/2     Aliens Cause Global Warming by Michael Crichton
        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1050644/posts
        \_ <snore>
        \_ i think SETI is a seriously premature attempt. Of all the
           possible things to search for, SETI choses to search at the most
           likely signal, which is in fact extremely unlikely, consider
           that there are SO MANY altneratives.
           i propose a model for deciding how to run government projects:
           give the rational researcher his money. see if he'd rather
           spend it right now on his research or put it in some fund with
           return X to and see how long he will wait for the available
           technology to mature before undertaking his endeaver with this
           appreciating captial.
        \_ this guy doesn't understands neither public policy nor science.
           what is his bullshit railing about "concensus science"? the
           ONLY way occam's razor can work is by concensus.
           \_ You misspelled consensus.  Also, you seem to have problems
              understanding the essence of occam's razor, namely that the
              simplest, rather than most popular, explanation is best.
              That there may or may not be a consensus on the simplest
              explanation is completely irrelevant.
              \_ I shouldn't be suprised you guys all hate science.  After all,
                 scientists all hate sysadmins, so turnabout is fair play
                 i guess.

1/2     The US planned an invasion of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia
        back in 1973 to seize their oil fields. Good thing
        we are above that sort of thing now:
        http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3333995.stm
        \_ Dur, this is at the end:
           "It is made clear that the invasion would probably only be
           contemplated if the situation in the region deteriorated to such
           an extent that the oil embargo went on for a long time, threatening
           western economies."
        \_ Oh the horror.. Why that is the last straw-- I hate the U.S. so much
           I want to learn German and move to Germany get taxed >50%!
           \_ Get a grip man, it was 30 years ago!
           \_ what is wrong with getting taxed 50% by a country that actually
              does something useful with that money?
              \_ Heh.  I see you neither lived, nor visited Germany, nor have
                 any friends who live there.
        \_ under Nixon, what a surprise.

1/2     Dean talks about race:  http://csua.org/u/5em
        (and the article sounds pretty pro-Dean)
        \_ republicans get poor white southerners to vote against their
           economic interests primarily by appealing to racism.  Dean
           understands this better than the other leading candidates, and
           has a better chance of trying to battle this strategy than they
           do.
                \_ troll?  The irony here is this behavior is exactly why you,
                   Dean and the Dems are doomed in the South.  Read Zell
                   Millers new book.  The South was solidly Democrat until the
                   late 70s, BTW.
                \_ troll?  The irony here is this exactly why you, Dean
        \_ I like the part where ihe meantions that it was wierd to be the
           only white guy in a romm of black guys.  Of course that's
           wierd.  But you get used to it.  I spent 2 years in a country
           full of Korean guys. It was only wierd for the first 2 minutes.
                   and the Dems are doomed in the South.  Read Zell Millers
                   new book.  The South was solidly Democrat until the late
                   70s, BTW.
        \_ Th3 D0ct0r 15 1n!

1/3     Is there a way to backup waypoints on a Garmin GPS to my PC without
        buying software?
        \_ As long as you have the PC-GPS cable, try downloading EasyGPS,
           http://www.easygps.com It's free. There are more like it out there.
          \_ Awesome!  Thanks!
        \_ Just FYI, the GPS data is sent through a standard RS232 port and
           all the information is simply plaintext in comma delimited format.
           You can use a term program and read the input directly from any
           GPS unit. Format of this data is publicly available everywhere.